[obol] Beach Across From Hatfield Visitor Center

[Cindy Ashy]

Today about 6:00 with the tide still very high but beginning to receed, I saw
88 sandpipers huddled up on sand mixed with rip-rap on the very western side of
the beach across from the Hatfield Visitor Center. I believe they were Western
Sandpipers but I'd like to ask for other possibilities for a shorebird in the
same size range with black legs and slender black beak? They were roosting and
packed in very dense...flew away as soon as the tide receeded enough to expose
some food. I'm posting this also because I've seen shorebirds huddled up here
at other high tides and they're fairly easy to miss and not on the nature
trail.

Also, there were several adult Ring-Billed Gulls on this beach...unless someone
can point out another possibility for a small-medium gull with bright yellow
eyes, bright to clearly yellow legs, and a yellow beak with a distictive
subterminal black ring. There were also several immature gulls which I think
may also have been ring-billed gulls but in the 3 guides I just checked, I
can't find the color of the legs on juveniles. The ones I saw had greyish beaks
with a very subtle pinkish hue with non-distinctive black "rings" or you could
almost call them smudges...and grey legs with the slightish tinge of pink. Any
ideas? There was also one small gull (looked like an adult) that didn't match
the others at all. It had a solid yellow beak with no spots and no rings, black
legs, and dark eyes. I want to call it a Black-Legged Kittiwake. Any other
possibilities?

Cindy Ashy

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